September 27, 2007

Here are pictures of the ones I dyed yesterday. I also included some close ups of two of them. Now to do something with them! I am currently working on a border for the beach scenes I posted a few days ago. Thank you to everyone who posted nice comments on my fabrics. I really appreciate it. I now have to order more fabric so I can dye some more. I must get back to the sewing portion of my art.

I have so many ideas of art in my head that I can't seem to find time to create even a small portion of it. That's because I don't know what to start on next. Does this happen to anyone else?

September 26, 2007

I've got the blues...hand dyed, that is... Here is a picture of a few of the blues I dyed yesterday. No blue cat or dog, either! I needed a variety of sky blues for my ocean scenes so I lucked out and got these nice pastels. I felt like a mad scientist in my kitchen measuring dye in little pots to get just the right combination of color. I also dyed 7 yards of other colors yesterday. I will get pictures posted of those. Really cool! The nice thing about dyeing is all the threads you collect from the pieces can be used to embellish other fiber art work. I just toss them in a drawer and combine them with others. They can be couched using the machine or by hand.

September 24, 2007

This little quilt for Emma was made in about 30 minutes today. She is now 3 months old and so sweet. She slept in my chair behind me while I stitched it on the machine and quilted it. It was super easy and I just love the soft, Minky backing. The front is flannel and it has cotton batting. As you can see in the pictures, she is already snuggling in it. This is her 2nd quilt. The picture of her in her bed is just for cuteness sake. The green stuffed toy is her doggy purse with rope handles.

Here are the results of dyeing more fabrics. This time I used an unbleached muslin (not Perma-Press). I'm not as happy with the results as when I used Kona's PFD (Prepared for Dyeing) muslin. But they are quite usable. I managed to squeeze in a few hours while hubby babysat for Emma so I could dye fabric. I didn't want her to be a bright pink puppy. I did manage to dye just one of my fingers a bright red. Apparently, there was a tiny hole in my rubber glove. Today, it is just around the nail bed so that it looks like a badly injured finger. Oh well, I will just put a Bandaid on it if I have to go anywhere today. I am off to make a new puppy quilt and work on an art quilt. Happy Monday!

September 23, 2007

Yesterday, I went to the Offray Ribbon outlet store in Hagerstown, MD. Wow! I was a bit overwhelmed. So many bargains! I had read about it in the Washington Post and then heard about it from a fellow artist. Spools of ribbon for 10 cents, 25 cents and less. I put it all out on my work table just to see how pretty it looks. I got all of this for $30 plus tax. Most of the ribbons are fabric so I can use them in my quilts and other creations. Some of my family and friends may see their B-day gifts wrapped in these delightful ribbons. They even had a all you can stuff in a bag for $1.09. I managed to get the piles of wide, satin ribbon in the bag. I like to tie up my quilts in this ribbon whenever I give a quilt as a gift. The most I paid was for the 53 yard spool of fabric ribbon that looks a tape measure was $7.95. OK, now that I've bored you with my pretty things, I must get to work. I am dyeing some more fabric today!

September 21, 2007

Here are some new ATCs I have made this week. They are just little creativity starters for me. The one with the bird and the Paris ATC area polished stone backgrounds. It was my first try at it. It uses glossy cardstock, Ranger's alcohol inks and felt.

You can't see the gold leafing or the glitter I used on some of these.

September 20, 2007

Today, I am posting pictures of the recent landscapes I painted using Setacolor transparent paints. At this point, they are unfinished and will need borders, quilting and embellishing. These are done on PFD fabrics (Prepared for Dyeing). Setacolor is tricky to use as you have to control the bleeding of the color into areas it shouldn't go in. But I am happy with the way these two evolved. After painting them, I placed them in the sun to develop. I will probably do some sun prints for the borders or I may use some of my hand dyed fabrics. I am amazed at how soft the fabric is after painting. After our time at the beach, I have lots of new ideas to keep me busy for awhile.

September 7, 2007

I thought I would have time to post pictures of our beach vacation but I just downloaded them to my computer. Once I get them sorted, I will post a few. In the meantime, these are pictures of Emma, our new Boston Terrier. She is so adorable and sweet! When she is not sleeping, she plays and plays until she just passes out on the floor. We are in the process of potty training. I have taken tons of pics of her but most are a bit blurry as she moves so fast! These will have to do until she wakes up again and I can take some good pictures. She weighs about 7 1/2 lbs. now.

While I was at the beach, I recorded in my journal our day by day fun on the beach. I have lots of sketches and ideas that I can't wait to interpret in my artwork. Being at the beach renews my spirit. More about the beach later.